


Borrowed Time - a sequel to 'A Stolen Moment'

by IreneClaire



Series: Various Notions Collection [40]
Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: Danny's POV, Feelings Realization, Feels, Fluff and Angst, Friendship/Love, Gen, Idiots in Love, M/M, Pining, Secret love, Sequel, Wishes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-15
Updated: 2021-03-15
Packaged: 2021-03-23 06:29:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,121
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30051339
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IreneClaire/pseuds/IreneClaire
Summary: Because 'A Stolen Moment' needed Danny's POV ...
Series: Various Notions Collection [40]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/138750
Comments: 7
Kudos: 37





	Borrowed Time - a sequel to 'A Stolen Moment'

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Calacious](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Calacious/gifts).



> Notes: A somewhat unexpected part 2 to the original one chapter gift for Calacious' birthday. Happy EXTENDED Birthday!  
> My thanks to Phoebe for simply coaching the muse to make it better through its numerous iterations. 
> 
> Thank you!

**H5O* H5O* H5O* H5O* H5O**

This was a new definition of borrowed time. A happier, more pleasant version that Danny chose to bury himself in right up to his eyeballs. Or, in this case, to the very tippy top of his aching head. The warmth grounded him. The touch, soothed, and he allowed himself the time to just drift lazily between wakefulness and sleep as he was cosseted by a familiar hand.

Faintly, he wondered if he was going to be in _over_ his head down the road because he knew what was happening. He didn't need to be fully conscious to know _who_ it even was. The repetitive motion was awkward, sometimes too soft. Sometimes much too off kilter as if the person standing over Danny wasn't sure of what he was doing - or how. The occasional motion on Danny's forehead also came and went like an errant tide. Definitely heavier and rougher, Steve's calloused thumb on his forehead was nonetheless still enough to lull Danny down.

 _Yeah_ , Danny let the thought linger: he was definitely in over his head. This could become an overwhelming curse and yet, Danny seemed destined to bring it upon himself because he _liked it._ He was going to be in over his head because he knew he'd remember Steve doing this when he woke up. He'd remember and not be able to say a damned word about it. Steve would also swear on a stack of his favorite Gun and Ammo magazines that it never happened. So Danny chose to steal this time and hoard it away, refusing to believe that it could be someone else entirely.

He focused on the size of the large hand that rested upon his head and on the way it moved. The awkwardness of each stroke and how Steve's fingers so hesitantly carded through his hair from front to back. All of the cues added up to _who_ it was either pushing his buttons and taking advantage ... or ... _or_ ... testing something more intimate.

Danny briefly shuttered that crazy thought. More intimate? No. Steve would never go there even if Danny might have privately. Secretly to himself after one or two beers - _okay maybe three or four_ \- while watching Steve manage a barbecue, spatula raised high in one hand. The other hand gesturing as wildly as Danny's might, fisting his own sweaty bottle, looking handsome as hell. Danny gave a mental swallow at the sight of his conjured up, dream-Steve and then promptly chastised himself.

 _Nah_. Stupid thought. This was Steve alright standing over him but he was probably taking advantage ... torturing Danny when he was defenseless ... because this was merely a case of Steve not being able to keep his hands to himself. This was Steve playing out a long-time simple joke between them over Danny's usually impeccably groomed hair. Certainly this was not Steve on the verge of testing something far more intimate because ... hell ... why would he?

Danny tried to mentally blink the sad thought away. He discounted it along with having any regrets. Right then, Danny didn't care one iota about future regrets because (he reasoned in a head that would be sure to ache badly enough once he opened his eyes), those were forever residing in some alternate universe. There would be nothing to regret because they weren't real, so he needed the _now_ to selfishly keep this borrowed time all to himself.

His sadness lapsed when Steve's fingers curved gently over a sore spot on his scalp. A new voice whispered a newer question of _why not._ It was loud enough to give him pause, too, because Steve's touch seemed kinder, sweeter here. Strong fingers lingered a soft caress, for a just moment, sparking a flicker of hope.

_Why not? Maybe ..._

But ... No. Danny was being delusional, only tempted by his emotions whose usual resolve had been weakened by far too many drugs. His hope dimmed again when Steve's fingers eventually moved on. Still patting, smoothing and just as tender. Danny tried to let it all go even though he thought he'd sensed all these things.

This would have to be enough.

So for _now,_ Danny tried to stay right where he was. Drifting between the here and now ... and his silent wants. Blind to everything except the awkward feel of Steve's hand running repetitively through his hair. Deaf to all except to the soft sound of a not so patient sigh.

He smiled inside his mind's eye though when something else dared tease at his senses. An odor so faint that it might not even be real. It could easily be his mind playing tricks on him. Nevertheless, Danny tried to focus more. He tried to cast out a weary net to lure that smell closer. And when he won it, dream-Steve coalesced in his imagination once more. Danny didn't remember when Steve's smell surpassed that odd flowery odor that had at one time conjured a vague memory of a second grade classroom. His first childish crush on his second grade teacher, Miss Ellen Green. For years into his adult life, that one-off smell of roses mixed with crayons could startle him. Make him smile at the nostalgia.

Not anymore though. Warmed wood and coffee grounds; sometimes both, co-mingled with gun oil and cordite had neatly displaced that young Miss Green. Steve's smell was fickle but Danny had it all ingrained no matter the day. Like now, as a murky, stale odor of a too strong coffee wafted across his nose. Maybe it shouldn't have been so pleasant and yet, it was.

Delusion, illusion or wishing for the impossible didn't matter. Things had changed and Danny was messed up in an out of the box kind of way. He borrowed this silent, secret time to revel in an awkward touch while inhaling all of Steve's presence, yearning for more.

He imagined Steve standing over him now, doting because Steve _wanted_ to dote on _him_ as much as Danny wished he might be. Not in some alternate universe, but in this one.

There was a sound next. Another murmur of an impatient sigh. Enough for Danny to want to reassure himself by seeing at least the outline of Steve's face. Fighting and arguing himself out of the place he'd been lulled into, Danny thought that he got his eyes to open. Mere slits to a room barely lit by machinery and that of a distant hallway. In those slim, hard-won milliseconds of time, Danny recognized the silhouette, hazy at it was.

And then, just before he slipped back under, Danny imagined that the look he thought he'd seen in Steve's eyes was half as wistful as what he felt in his heart.

_**~ End. ~** _


End file.
